Playing time has been scarce for Brett Connolly
In his first season with the Washington Capitals, it’s been hard for forward Brett Connolly to get on the ice. Through the first 34 games, he was a frequent healthy scratch. When he did play, he averaged 10:41 per game, the second-lowest time in his career and the lowest among regular forwards on the team. He made the most of it with a career-high 15 goals, and of NHL players who had reached that marker, Connolly had played the fewest minutes.
In the playoffs, what little ice time Connolly was getting has been cut down significantly. Capitals coach Barry Trotz shortened his bench in the last three games of Washington’s series against the Toronto Maple Leafs, and as a result, Connolly was credited with playing 4:26, 6:12 and 5:34, respectively.
“Obviously, not ideal,” Connolly said. “The last three games, there’s not much you can do with the ice time I was given. You know, I just tried to make a positive impact, play good in my own end, be a positive teammate, encourage the guys and hopefully I can play a little more in this series. You’ve just got to stick with it. Barry chose to go with a certain amount of guys, and that’s it.”
Ice time often reflects how a coach thinks a player is performing. Simply put: the better you play, the more you play. Connolly’s minutes could indicate he will find himself out of the lineup entirely during this second-round series against the Pittsburgh Penguins.
Defenceman Karl Alzner seems to be nearing a return from an undisclosed upper-body injury that sidelined him for the past four games, and Nate Schmidt has played well in his place, creating a dilemma of who to play on the blue line in this series. It’s possible Washington solves that problem by scratching its 12th forward and debuting a lineup of seven defencemen for Alzner to draw back in.
Though the Capitals haven’t played with seven defencemen all season (or last year either), Trotz said he would consider that option. With Connolly averaging the fewest minutes and not on any special teams, he would logically be the one pushed out. Asked if the drastic decrease in ice time warranted a conversation with Connolly, Trotz’s response was cryptic.
“I think he gets it,” Trotz said. “But I’ll talk to him. We haven’t talked a lot. We talked at the start of the series that everybody understands that everything is done for the now, and it’s ‘don’t take anything personal,’ and they don’t. Hopefully, he doesn’t. But we’ll talk a little bit.”